Sampah Nonsense

History of Free Money

- Trashed by SampahMan @ 1:55 AM

Yes, that's 1 measly USD. It came in the mail today, as a reward if I filled in their survey. I could have chosen not to do the survey, but since they were sincere enough to pay me first, I did it (and it only took me 10 minutes to get $1, as compared to Adsense, 2 clicks so far, $0.24, not even a quarter).

This reminds me of the days in college, when I used to troll the Fatwallet forums just looking for online surveys that paid money (usually in forms of online gift certificates).

Here's how it works:
You go to the website with the survey, you sign up for the survey, and then after the survey (normally a few months down the line), they will send to your email an online gift certificate (usually from Amazon.com), probably in the numeration of $5 - $25.


See how this could be exploited? Most of us created about 150 email addresses, and did the survey repeatedly (with the help of Gator, of cuz). Then we waited for the payout. Say, if maybe 50 of your emails got selected for the gift certs of $25 dollars each, then that would be $1250 worth of gift certs at Amazon. And that's $25 dollars worth of STACKABLE certs, which means that if you buy something worth 50 bucks, you could combine 2 gift certs together.
Shopping spree anyone?

I've had seniors who bought themselves TVs, digital camcorders, etc, for the price of $0 (yes, damn you Nigel).

Unfortunately, I got in on this a little too late, because by the time I wisened up to such deals, the marketers were a lot smarter about this type of scam. The most I've ever gotten were $5 UNSTACKABLE certificates, which means that it is effectively a $5 dollar discount. Oh well, better than nothing right?

On another note, if you're planning to stay in the US in the future, know that YOU, the consumer, are KING. I can remember those free CD-Rs I've always gotten for free (after a Mail in Rebate, of cuz). Fatwallet is your friend. Spend some time to check this deal out. FYI, PM = Price Match. Like how Carrefour matches a competitor's price, and adds on a 10% discount.

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